Mitsubishi Chemical Invests in Australia’s Licella Holdings

Diamond Edge Ventures, the corporate venture capital arm of Mitsubishi Chemical Group, announced today that it has invested in Licella Holdings, an Australian leader in advanced recycling and renewable fuel technologies. The funding will help accelerate Licella’s global expansion and commercial deployment of its proprietary Catalytic Hydrothermal Reactor (Cat-HTR) technology.

Licella’s Cat-HTR process is an innovative technology that converts waste plastics and biomass into oils in supercritical water at high temperatures and pressures, which are then refined to produce chemical feedstocks and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation (MCC), which has partnered with ENEOS Corporation in the plastics-to-oil business, recently opened a new chemical recycling facility at its Ibaraki Works. The facility uses the Hydro-PRT technology from UK-based Mura Technology, which is based on Licella’s Cat-HTR technology.

The feature of Licella’s Cat-HTR process is that it can convert not only plastics into oil, but also biomass into oil. In the “Pre-feasibility Study to Start Commercialization of Sustainable Aviation Fuel, Bio-naphtha and Renewable Diesel from Domestic Forest Residues” announced on March 27, 2025, MCC envisions using Licella’s technology to produce SAF, bio-naphtha, renewable diesel and other products from wood residues.